Try this thought experiment: You decide to donate money to Mitt Romney. You want change in the Oval Office, so you engage in your democratic right to send a check.
Several days later, President Barack Obama, the most powerful man on the planet, singles you out by name. His campaign brands you a Romney donor, shames you for “betting against America,” and accuses you of having a “less-than-reputable” record. The message from the man who controls the Justice Department (which can indict you), the SEC (which can fine you), and the IRS (which can audit you), is clear: You made a mistake donating that money.
Are you worried?
Richard Nixon’s “enemies list” appalled the country for the simple reason that presidents hold a unique trust. Unlike senators or congressmen, presidents alone represent all Americans. Their powers—to jail, to fine, to bankrupt—are also so vast as to require restraint. Any president who targets a private citizen for his politics is de facto engaged in government intimidation and threats. This is why presidents since Nixon have carefully avoided the practice.
Save Mr. Obama, who acknowledges no rules. This past week, one of his campaign websites posted an item entitled “Behind the curtain: A brief history of Romney’s donors.” In the post, the Obama campaign named and shamed eight private citizens who had donated to his opponent. Describing the givers as all having “less-than-reputable records,” the post went on to make the extraordinary accusations that “quite a few” have also been “on the wrong side of the law” and profiting at “the expense of so many Americans.”
These are people like Paul Schorr and Sam and Jeffrey Fox, investors who the site outed for the crime of having “outsourced” jobs. T. Martin Fiorentino is scored for his work for a firm that forecloses on homes. Louis Bacon (a hedge-fund manager), Kent Burton (a “lobbyist”) and Thomas O’Malley (an energy CEO) stand accused of profiting from oil. Frank VanderSloot, the CEO of a home-products firm, is slimed as a “bitter foe of the gay rights movement.”
These are wealthy individuals, to be sure, but private citizens nonetheless. Not one holds elected office. Not one is a criminal. Not one has the barest fraction of the position or the power of the U.S. leader who is publicly assaulting them.
Once again Obama earns the adjectives “historic” and “unprecedented.”
The Obots will be clapping with glee but they only care about tribal wins and losses. The OWSers will be crowing about beating up on the 1%ers but I guess they never heard of Martin Niemöller:
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I wasn’t a Jew.When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
Power that is not guided by principle is a bad thing.
(h/t Lola-at-Large)
Filed under: 2012 Elections, Barack Obama Tagged: | Barack Obama, Mitt Romney

also many forget these words
Divide and conquer
A house divided against itself can not stand
this man has done more to divide the people of this country than any in my lifetime.
Different political opinions were celebrated at one time in this country. I did not have to agree with you, but I would fight for your right to have a different opinion
“Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
Power attracts the corrupt and corruptible. Obama was a corrupt, sociopathic fraud before being elected to public office.
When POTUS is doing this, he’s also sending a clear signal down to his cabinet and his cronies that they should likewise be leaning on their underlings to NOT support Romney.
That’s a good point. How can you be working for the POTUS and still commit the crime of supporting Romney?
If you adopt an African kid while being Republican, you are going to get hate mail.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/frenchrevolution/2012/04/26/i’m-a-white-republican-raising-a-black-child-deal-with-it/
Haters gotta hate.
Didn’t the McCains do that?
McCain’s daughter is from Bangladesh (which was part of India until 1947). I believe the Bangladeshi consider themselves Dravidian or Asian (as do other south Asians).
I remember being treated as less than a second class person,designated to fail because I was a foster child. Go to a clinic for any medical problem and being treated with contempt. Not expected to do well in school and surprising people when I did.
Many of the so-called upper class had the manners and less smarts then a goat.
This is one reason I can not understand, why some people do not want to better themselves and be treated with respect.
They would rather have handouts and be treated with contempt and lose opportunities for them and their children.
In this country, we are lucky enough to find opportunity if we look for it and prepare for it in spite of the idiots who had opportunity handed to them and did not know what to do with it.
sorry about the rant
I love a good rant.
Honk!
I agree, HELENK. I have a student who is brilliant and whose family is trying to dissuade from continuing her education. I know it is expensive, but there are grants and loans, etc and she will be – she IS a wonder already. But the family “can’t afford” for her to go to school and become financially successful.
I’m not even halfway in, and this article is a wonder so far. I know all of these works and artists and had already formulated ideas about cultural hegemony and the pretentious “post-modernist” movement of pre-WWII Europe, and how the mindset has infected the world and helped bring about paradigm changes in various social areas, especially education (my field) and politics.
Hope the rest is half as good as the set up. Back to reading.
Not to short-change the “Modernists” themselves, who deserve their fair share of credit, but they actually suffered in WWI, unlike the slags of the PM movement.
“Europe has its Hitlers, but we have our Rotarians.”
Worth the read for that quote alone. That was delicious. Thank you for sharing.
Makes me want to write a check. To Mitt.
That was my first thought too.
Ding Ding Ding!Winner!!!!
I guess John Cole missed the part about George Zimmerman being a Democrat. He probably voted for Obama too.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/04/27/wingnut-welfare-is-the-shit/#comment-3211840
happy Arbor Day
http://freebeacon.com/retreet/
not sure about the cost yet
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2012/04/27/Biden-My-Image-Military%20Commander-Was-Slim-Pickens-on-Atom%20Bomb-Yelling-Yippee-Ki-Yay
this is our vice president??? how sad
I say that Biden couldn’t say anything more stupid than the day before. And , I’m wrong again
this Islamic protest did not turn out as expected
http://weaselzippers.us/2012/04/27/video-australian-atheists-chant-where-are-the-women-after-islamists-attempt-to-crash-their-convention/
Sheesh, that pisses me of! This is the kind of crap that caused me to suffer retaliation during the 2008 primary. Seriously, my Hillary signs were torn up, my car windows were broken, and my fence was vandalized.
You know how people are whining about how oppressive it is to require ID in order to vote? Well, in my very liberal state, we have to be registered by address and we’re publically listed online with the SOS, what party you belong to, when you voted, etc, all available for the general public to see. It’s enough to make us hesitant about even voting anymore.
I’m stubborn, so I’ll be damned if I’m going to be intimidated into not voting, but just for the record, I feel like my rights have been infringed upon and I’ve changed by normal behavior, like I’m not going to put up any political signs in my yard.
Leadership comes from the top down. President Obama has set the tone and it’s not a good one. You should not be able to harass, intimidate, and bully people. Not in America.
We only do that to people in other countries.
‘… we have to be registered by address and we’re publically listed online with the SOS, what party you belong to, when you voted, etc, all available for the general public to see. It’s enough to make us hesitant about even voting anymore.’
As the site I posted a couple of days back on voting rules in France stated: ‘Voting is strictly personal and strictly secret : it is an offense to try and control voting choice. It is even an offense to try and know one’s voting choice’, and that’s how I used to think all Democracies worked: that it was a democratic right to keep your vote both secret, personal and private. And that it was a personal choice whether you wanted to make it public.
I still think that’s how it ought to be.
It really is scary how authoritarian the Democratic Party has gotten under Obama.
Obama sucks.
Somebody should make an ad with a giant sucking sound as we watch 14 trillion dollars, foreclosed homes, and our jobs go down the drain. We can call it “Obama sucks”.
He also eats dogs.
OT
the other night we were talking about videos, here is a story that people and videos sometimes do not see or show the whole story
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/04/27/texas-father-says-couple-was-oblivious-to-crying-son-after-foul-ball/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+foxnews%2Fmost-popular+%28Internal+-+Most+Popular+Content%29
maybe the American people should start making lists of where OUR money goes under backtrack.
here is a start
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2012/04/greenfail.php
Way back when I was a peon at DU, those asshats were checking into my donor records. As a way to indict me. And, look… I don’t have much $$. The only camp I had ever donated to was Hillary’s (and a couple of local Dems.)
The “enemies” list is far reaching. It includes all of us.
Most disturbing.